Conversational Media Marketing

As you can see, I had to weigh in with a comment of my own.

More to the point, you'd think by now that we would have reached some degree of understanding about how pitching to bloggers should be done -- as if we're a special class that needs its own set of rules. ("Elitist" is the term I used in my comment.)

PR pros and bloggers have been writing about this issue for years.

Veteran PR blogger BL Ochman addressed the issue in July of 2004 in a post entitled, The PR Lessons of a Clueless Blog Pitch (BL has a way with words doesn't she?) in which she outlined several suggestions:

• Address the blogger by his/her name, or just say "hi." Never say "dear editor" or "dear sir/madam" (honest, I get pitches addressed that way.)
• Don't tell anyone they "must" or "should" write a story or book a guest. Instead, explain why the topic is of interest and why this person an expert worth knowing. Don't be cute.
• Reporters and bloggers all follow headlines. Explain how the idea or person you are pitching ties into a current news item or a trend.
• Let the blogger know you've at least looked at the publication and see if you can find something to praise. For God's sake though, don't say "Loved your great post the other day" unless you read it and you mean it. People who look at dozens of releases and pitches a day can pick up on baloney faster than a hungry hound.
• Don't whine if you don't get coverage by saying you "can't believe" the blogger didn’t include, won't write about, haven't heard of XYZ company.
• Bloggers aim to provide a personal view of the news. They write in conversational style as an antidote to the canned news of traditional media. Why would you send a canned PR-speak pitch?
• Run your content through Bullfighter or similar software to be sure it is bullshit and jargon-free before you send it out.

Add to that a 2006 post by Top Rank Marketing blogger Lee Odden in which he rendered a set of guidelines that I think are worth repeating. Succinctly stated, they are:

1. Be relevant
2. Personalize
3. Make it easy
4. Swag is good
5. Be persistent

Most recently (like, two days ago), Matt Haughey, writing directly in response to Trapani's blacklist made the following suggestions:

• Don’t ever send a press release to a blogger based on a purchased list
• Go beyond the press release
• Introduce a feedback loop
• Provide an unsubscribe link
• Use metrics to help you do your PR job

And no one writes more well-reasoned, expertly opinioned commentary than PR blogger Brian Solis. He weighs in on the issue here .

(I hope you'll take time to review each of the above referenced posts to get the full force of their argument.)

Add to these a couple of great resources:

• Art and Science of Blogger Relations - Free ebook from Brian Solis (PDF)
• Shift Communications blogger relations tipsheet (PDF)

Let's convene a summit

Even with all that, we have yet to reach concensus on how to pitch bloggers. Therefore, I want to make the following recommendation as a way to remedy the problem that so obviously still exists: Convene a summit.

MarketingProfs would be the perfect organization to serve as host. A panel of experts representing both sides of the issue would be charged with determining a set of guidelines.

(Of course, let's not overlook the need for grassroots participation. Any interested party should have the right to weigh in. Maybe an acceptable set of standards could even be devised via the means of crowdsourced co-creation.)

Regardless of the method(s) employed, it seems to me a set of best practices/guidelines/standards (whatever you want to call them) in how to pitch bloggers needs to be created -- standards which everyone in the industry agrees to abide.

I know, that's a long shot. Probably won't happen. But, considering the brouhaha that developed as a result of Mack's post, it certainly needs to... for it's still a touchy subject to be sure.

PS: I need to admit that I rarely, if ever, get pitched by PR folk. Hence, my frustration level is yet untapped. If I were getting hundreds per week, I might feel more rancor over the matter. Nonetheless, my previous point stands.